Academic freedom is besieged from all sides. While teachers worry about the Massachusetts loyalty oaths, their students fret over the draft. But the Cambridge City Council, unmindful of the persecution already blackening the sacred halls of learning, has launched yet another unprovoked attack on one of Harvard's most cherished traditions--jaywalking.

Those who have not experienced the exhilaration dodging snorting buses along Massachusetts Ave, cannot imagine the feeling of absolute release, the joy of danger challenged and defeated that purges the mind and leaves it ready to tackle the knottiest of scholastic problems. Has Councillor Mahoney ever stood on the center strip while a Volkswagen buzzed past only inches from his nose? We doubt it.

We plead with the good councillors to relent, to restore jaywalking to its place among the blissful adventures of college life. But if the City will not act, then the Harvard community must, with a massive campaign of civil disobedience. If the 10,000 men of Harvard are determined to jaywalk, then all the kings and powers of this earth will not stand in their way.